The pure beauty and realized potential of budding artists moved me to write this tonight. The Pre-Professional Intensive Evening of Dance at Perry-Mansfield reminded me what a gift this life really is.

This summer has stretched our hearts and minds. It has been filled with so much senseless violence that we are all casting about for answers, some kind of reconciliation between what we thought we could count on and what continues to unfold. In this jumble of tears, anger, shock, and sometimes numbness, it is hard to find the core of meaning in this life on Earth.

I saw a glimpse on the stage of Dance Studio tonight. There is something special about dance as a medium for beauty. It is such a direct human expression. Whenever I see a good dance performance, I am reminded of soaring human potential. We are capable of so much beauty. The students tonight were so strong, delicate, fearless, and driven. Their bodies radiated light.

This is beauty that humanity can create: the music that accompanied the dance; the costumes that fit just right; the light that set it in a time and place. These elements are symbolic of  that which every human is capable. The lives that were lost in Orlando, Dallas, Nice…these lives created this same beauty. Perhaps not on stage, but, in their own unique way, they contributed to the fabric of human kindness. The misguided people who ended this potential must not have had any beauty in their lives. They lost touch with what life on Earth is all about. They forgot that each one of us is a well of unlimited love.

There is no way that someone can witness these expressions of beauty and life and not appreciate the sanctity of life.  We are here for a brief moment in time. We strive to bring something to the world that embodies the grace from which we came. It is up to all of us to protect, encourage, and express this love.  Embody it. Move with it. Appreciate it. This love is all we have.